1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a cooking apparatus, and more particularly, to a cooking apparatus having a timer function for setting an arbitrary time period for a timer.
2. Description of the Related Art
A cooking apparatus of interest to the present invention is disclosed. for example, in Japanese Patent Laying-Open No. 7-260162. This laid-open application discloses, in a cooking apparatus such as a microwave oven, an equipment having a function of common cooking timer controlling time of driving a heater, and a function of an optional timer allowing setting of an arbitrary time period, independent from the cooking timer. In this equipment, the time for driving the heater in the cooking apparatus is counted parallel to counting of the arbitrary time period, and counted times are displayed one at a time on a display unit, by switching operation.
In the above described equipment, it is possible to set the timer for setting the arbitrary time period, hereinafter referred to as an optional timer, while the cooking timer is in operation. If a user is not accustomed to setting of the timer and takes much time for setting, or if the user has to do something else while interrupting the timer setting operation, the equipment is kept in the middle of timer setting operation, that is, the equipment is left in the standby state, waiting for the input of the arbitrary time period. In this state, remaining time of the cooking timer, that is, the remaining time of driving the heater, is not displayed, either. This is inconvenient for subsequent cooking procedure. Further, when the equipment is kept in this state for a considerable time period and the user wishes to operate the cooking timer or the optional timer, there is no information provided on the display for the desired operation, leaving the user confused.